"Earth's preparatory school must be improved to the utmost," writes Mrs. Eddy in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 486). What an interesting way to contemplate human existence—a preparatory school! It is so entirely different from the usual way of looking at it. For is not human existence to many often but an enigmatical period of time, filled up by a mass of sorrow and suffering, unrelieved to any great extent by that joyousness, that happiness which, whether they may define it to themselves or not, is what humanity sighs for and desires? The name "preparatory school" may seem to indicate a future state; but as Christian Science points out, the only future state which any one should desire to enter is the realization and demonstration of the real man, the perfect spiritual idea of God.
In considering the question of "earth's preparatory school," two things should be kept clearly before us. First, the great spiritual fact that man is the image of God; and that since God is perfect Mind, and man is the image or reflection of perfect Mind, man is already perfect. Secondly, that mankind is not the image or reflection of perfect Mind, but an imperfect, and, therefore, unreal concept. Remembering these truths, one is in the position of being able to wisely survey the human situation. The human race has, throughout untold generations, labored with its problems; bit by bit the truth about God and man has been revealed to it, until that truth has never been more clearly understood than now; and never have men been in a better position to apply it to all the problems of human existence, than since Christian Science was given to the world.
Briefly, then, human existence may be said to be a preparatory school to men, since they are striving to emancipate themselves from the false, the sinful, the diseased conditions which beset human existence. And it is interesting in this connection to study the lives of some of the worthy, those who have been obedient to their highest understanding of good, and, accordingly, have nobly served their fellow-men. If one takes the case of Moses, for example, it is found that up to the time he led forth the children of Israel from the bondage of Egypt his whole life was a long preparation for that stupendous task. Born of Hebrew parents, to escape the dire mandate of Pharaoh,—"Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river,"—the infant Moses was placed in an "ark of bulrushes" and laid "in the flags by the river's brink." All are familiar with his rescue, and how he was afterward reared at the court of Pharaoh, as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. Unquestionably, while there he would be instructed in the learning of the age, acquiring a knowledge of government and an insight into political and social motives. Then "it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out unto his brethren, and looked on their burdens;" and in his wrath at the tyranny of the Egyptians he slew one of them, "and hid him in the sand." The sequel was his flight "from the face of Pharaoh" into the land of Midian, where he "kept the flock of Jethro." After many quiet years of meditation, he was humble enough to be led by God back to Egypt, along with Aaron his brother, to bring about the delivery of the Hebrews. What a schooling Moses had during those forty years! And all those years of preparation were necessary to equip him for the task he had to perform. Even after the people were delivered out of Pharaoh's hand, other forty years had to be spent in the wilderness before the land of Canaan was reached. And during the whole of this time Moses was being disciplined; all these fourscore years he was being led into a fuller, richer knowledge of God, and to a truer understanding of his real, spiritual selfhood.
